


i never really had much faith in the universe's magic

by ironicbird



Category: DCU, DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Superboy (Comics), Teen Titans (Comics), Young Justice (Comics)
Genre: Fluff, Humor, M/M, Magic, Original Villain Character - Freeform, Pining, Slow Build, Tim Drake-centric, both tim and kon's flirting style is to tease the other relentlessly, core four vibes, except they're all older than they were in YJ lol, just for the plot he isn't the focus, multiple actually cause let tim sleep 2k20, tim drake gets a nap, tried to channel some of the dumbfuckery of the original YJ comics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:28:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27582053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironicbird/pseuds/ironicbird
Summary: “You were just scared that I would take him down quick, weren’t you? You had to send me away.” Kon bragged teasingly to Cassie.“It should be ‘quickly’,” Tim said pointedly, his mouth curving into a slight grin.Kon put a hand up to his forehead and shot Tim a look that could be described as just south of murderous intent. Cassie crossed her arms and stared at Tim. Bart just rolled his eyes.“Maybe that light he was hit with was a spell that makes him always have to fix bad grammar?” Bart suggested.“What kind of supervillain puts a spell on someone like that? An angry English major?” Kon retorted.---------------------------------------------When Tim gets hit by some unknown magic while fighting an absolutely ridiculous supervillain (seriously, he thought they had left their stupidly weird supervillains behind in their Young Justice days), the team has to try to figure out was exactly the spell did to Tim. The only problem is, there is no indication that there is anything different about Tim from before. It definitely couldn’t have anything to do with some feelings that Tim had been repressing but were suddenly resurfacing right?Right?
Relationships: Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent
Comments: 56
Kudos: 293





	1. yeah, i could be punching. but i always tend to fluctuate

**Author's Note:**

> This is a drabble that got way out of hand and ended up becoming a >10K word monster. It actually survived against all odds because my computer started going bonkers (I couldn’t use my trackpad or the bottom row of my keyboard) but I was able to transfer my word doc with this as well as more important stuff like my uni notes to my Google drive right before it died completely. This fic just wanted to get out there I suppose. I am already almost finished with it, I don’t post fics unless I’m at least 90% done with it, otherwise I’ll never finish it. I’ve been working on this for over a fuckin month cause I haven’t had a lot of time to write lol.
> 
> I’m in the process of trying to write my first attempt at a very lengthy and detailed fanfic (the draft of which was saved too don’t you worry) but I had to get this idea out of my head first so here we are. I wrote a lot of this when I was supposed to be studying for the GRE and it’s a little messy by my standards, but I also have unrealistically high standards for myself. Un-beta’d because we die like Robins and I don’t have any friends that are into comics anyways. Hope you enjoy!
> 
> Last thing: All of the titles for this fic are taken from the song "mother tongue" by Bring Me The Horizon. Highly recommend that song. It made me, a notorious love cynic, almost believe that I could ever find love.

The first thing that Tim wanted to do upon returning to consciousness was find the parade of elephants that had trampled all over his head and destroy them. Of course, he wasn’t literally trampled by a parade of elephants, but he might as well have been. He must have taken a pretty bad blow out in the field since his head felt as though it had been used as the basketball at an NBA match.

Tim could hear Connor, Cassie, and Bart talking around him, but he couldn’t concentrate on what they were saying because every word out of their mouth sounded like a bell being rung right by his head. Not like those tiny, twinkly bells that you hear around Christmas time either, more like giant church bells. Those massive bells were going “BING BONG BING BONG” right next to his ears. Tim didn’t dare open his eyes because he knew that the bright lights would just make the pounding in his head even worse. He could already tell by the amount of light coming through his eyelids that he was most likely either in the med bay at the tower or in the middle of the sun. Either way, it was too much light for his poor demolished brain to handle right now. He was lying face up on what he assumed was a gurney, his head propped up by a pillow and a slight incline of the upper half of the gurney.

“Muh,” Tim heard himself say, as the more eloquent phrase that he had wanted to use in an effort to tell his friends to be quieter had failed to come out as he had hoped. Unfortunately, they did not seem to understand his intended message.

“Guys, he’s waking up!” Tim heard Bart say excitedly.

“Tim, are you okay?” Cassie asked, her voice filled with concern.

Tim just groaned again. He’s had some nasty whumps in the past for sure, as that was all in a day’s work for someone in this particular industry. This was the first to really knock his head out of commission this badly. The rest of his body felt as he expected after a typical lengthy battle. It was definitely not 100%, as he could feel multiple bruises and he had a tight feeling in his chest, but it was nothing compared to the pain in his head. His head felt like it had gone through a woodchipper and then been pieced back together by a toddler using glitter glue.

“You took a pretty nasty hit Rob,” Kon said, “You don’t have to get up quick.”

“It’s quickly,” Tim choked out.

“What?” Kon asked, confused.

Tim slowly turned his head towards the direction that Kon’s voice was coming from and gingerly opened his eyes. His vision was slightly blurred, but he could still make out the confused and concerned expression on Kon’s face.

“It’s quickly,” Tim clarified, staring right into Kon’s blue eyes, “The sentence should be ‘You don’t have to get up quickly.’ You have to use an adverb there.”

The entire room let out an exasperated sigh.

“He’s fine,” Cassie said, rolling her eyes.

“Besides the mother of all headaches, sure,” Tim replied.

“Do you remember what happened?” Kon asked.

Tim shook his head slowly, “I remember that we were going up against some magic user that was terrorizing downtown. He said something to me that I don’t remember. Then there was a bright light, and then nothing.”

“He smacked you with something magicky,” Bart added, “We don’t know what, but you went down hard.”

“I told Kon to bring you back here while the rest of us took the guy down,” Cassie said.

Tim nodded, “That was the right call.”

Kon’s weakness towards magic meant that he wouldn’t have been as effective as the others against a magic user anyways. If the hit had been truly as bad as it seemed, he would have needed immediate medical attention. Tim would just ignore the fact that the idea of Kon carrying him bridal-style gently to safety made his heart beat just a little bit faster. He was most likely still partially delirious from his head injury. It definitely had nothing to do with any sort of feelings he had been repressing recently. Kon bringing him back to the Tower was simply the most strategic move given the circumstances.

“You were just scared that I would take him down quick, weren’t you? You had to send me away.” Kon bragged teasingly to Cassie.

“It should be ‘quickly’ again,” Tim said pointedly, his mouth curving into a slight grin.

Kon put a hand up to his forehead and shot Tim a look that could be described as just south of murderous intent. Cassie crossed her arms and stared at Tim with an expression that suggested Tim was moving from the simple nuisance category into the absolute irritation category in her mind. Bart just rolled his eyes.

“Maybe that light he was hit with was a spell that makes him always have to fix bad grammar?” Bart suggested.

“What kind of supervillain puts a spell on someone like that? An angry English major?” Kon retorted.

“I’m pretty sure he’s just trying to annoy us,” Cassie said, her gaze locked onto Tim with her arms still crossed. She always did have a knack for seeing through the shenanigans.

Tim grinned again, “Is it working?”

The collective groan that permeated the room indicated that it was in fact, working.

“Well, we have the guy in custody, maybe we can ask him what he actually did hit Tim with,” Cassie said.

Tim knitted his eyebrows, “Besides my terrible headache, I don’t feel any different. Maybe it was a purely physical attack.”

“With magic you can’t be too sure. Better to be safe than sorry,” Cassie replied.

Tim nodded. It wasn’t a bad idea. For all he knew, the magic he was hit with could potentially compromise the team. It was a long shot, but it didn’t hurt to pursue every angle. He didn’t want to be potentially mind controlled in the middle of the night in order to compromise the security of the tower. He didn’t want to potentially black out every time someone said “pineapple.” He also didn’t want to potentially be turned into a chicken the next time he ordered KFC. Magic was unpredictable and could have unforeseen side effects.

Tim began making the effort to push himself up to a fully sitting position. His head was still screaming bloody murder, but he wanted to be there when the group questioned their captured villain. Unfortunately, the team noticed his movements. Really, it wasn’t hard to notice with the pained grunts and groans that Tim wasn’t able to hold back during his attempt to sit up. Tim felt two strong hands grab his shoulders. He tried to fight this grip that came out of nowhere, but the hands held fast. Tim looked up to see Kon was the one who was gently trying to guide Tim back down to his pillow. Tim made another effort to wriggle out of Kon’s grasp but failed.

“Dude, you are not getting up right now,” Kon said, “You’re clearly not okay yet.”

“Mm fine,” Tim tried to retort, but the words came out more softly than he had intended.

Cassie sighed and ran a hand through her hair, “We can handle this, Tim. Get some rest. We’ll have the answers when you wake up.”

Tim let out a small hum as he let himself be eased downward back into the pillow by Kon. He felt oddly safe and content, and he could already feel some of the tension in his muscles leaking away. Sleep was sneaking into the corners of his brain that weren’t still screaming. His attempt to rise must have burned off any energy reserves he had. That was in addition to the fact that other than his induced unconsciousness, he had only averaged about two hours of sleep a night for the past week. Tim wanted to move, but his body needed to rest in order to heal.

The last thing he remembered was the team leaving the room. Bart speeded out with Cassie following. Kon lingered for a moment longer before leaving as well. Then, Tim lost the fight with his treasonous eyelids and fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed! Hit me up on Tumblr and Twitter @scarletbirbs for both. They’re both newer accounts and I’m really trying to build them up and also to get some comics friends so yeah. I’m more active on Tumblr so if you really wanna reach me, hit me up there.
> 
> This chapter is the shortest by far I swear. The whole fic breaks 10k words (rn it’s at like, 13k but I’m still not done with chapter 4) so I swear we get there but this chapter is just sort of build up. I should post the next chapter in about a week.
> 
> I am attempting to channel some of the absolute dumbassery of the OG Young Justice comics from the late 90s/00s into this story cause I wanted something kind of light hearted and funny. Please feel free to let me know what you think. And I’m really only using the core four in this story even though they were never really on a team alone but I didn’t want to complicate things by bringing in more characters. This was supposed to be a drabble before I couldn’t stop it from being longer so…
> 
> Also feel free to chat in the comments! I’m going to try and do a better job of replying to all of them than I have on previous fics.


	2. no amount of words could ever find a way to make sense of this

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mentioned this in the notes last chapter, but I want to reiterate that all of the titles for this fic come from “mother tongue” by Bring Me The Horizon because it’s such a good song and I listened to it a lot while writing this fic. I tend to be rather cynical about love in my own life, but that song almost made me believe in it again. (almost). The lead singer wrote the song about and for his wife and it’s just really sweet. But also, I like to use song lyrics for my titles of things because I am shit at coming up with titles on my own lmao.
> 
> Anyways, the next update probably won’t come for a bit unless I break down and post chapter 3 but then chapter 4 won’t come for a bit because I’m still writing it. Also, I’m going into my finals season and I have like two papers, a group project, an R coding assignment that I don’t understand, and miscellaneous job responsibilities coming up but I will make sure that this fic is fully completed by mid to late December. I’m only still writing chapter 4, but that chapter is a fuckin beast. I’m at ~4k words on it and I’ve still got a whole ton left to write on it. But not to pat myself on the back too much, I really like how chapter 4 is coming along and I am excited for y’all to get to read it.
> 
> Announcements over, I hope you all enjoy chapter 2.

When Tim woke again, he was alone in the medbay. He could see from the window that the sun had gone down. How long was he out? There weren’t any clocks in his immediate field of vision for him to tell.

The war in his head had subsided to a mild skirmish. It was still obnoxious, but not as incapacitating as it had been in his previous bout of consciousness.

Tim made the effort to raise himself to a sitting position once more, finding it easier than it had been previously but still mildly difficult. He was still hurting from his various injuries, but they were more manageable. The biggest thing was still his head, but it had slid down on the scale of pain from completely debilitating to mildly burdensome. The team must have given him some sort of medication or pain killer.

After Tim pulled himself into the sitting position, he gingerly lowered his feet to the ground. He was still in his costume, but the team had pulled off most of it to make him more comfortable. His boots, utility belt, and cape were all removed. The floor was cold against Tim’s bare feet, but he hardly noticed. He made his way slowly to the door and pushed the button for the opening mechanism.

“LOCKED” the small screen above the mechanism displayed in large red letters.

Tim stared at it, confused. He tried the button again, but the same series of events simply replayed themselves. He had been locked in the medbay. Tim peered out of the small window on the door to see if there was anything in the hallway, but it was completely empty.

There were a couple possible reasons this could have occurred. One, the team wanted to force him to get more sleep. Fat chance. Two, the tower had been compromised. Unlikely, as there would probably be more alarms blaring or at least more sounds of a struggle occurring. However, this possibility could not be ruled out, as it could be a covert invasion. Three, there was just a mechanical malfunction. Entirely possible, but Tim would have to take a closer look at the mechanism to be sure.

Or four, the team found out something from the man who magicked Tim that they were afraid of.

Tim wasn’t sure what to do if it was option number four, but for now he had to take things step by step. The first step was opening this door. He looked around the room to see if his utility belt was lying around, but it was not. The team must have put it away in their uniform storage area. That meant that his communicator was gone as well. Damn. It was alright though, Tim could figure this out by himself.

Tim dug through the cabinets and found a scalpel, forceps, and some scissors. Perfect. He returned to the door and used the scalpel to gently unscrew the panel below the locking mechanism. It was harder than he anticipated, as a scalpel is not designed to be used as a screwdriver, but he managed. He peeled back the panel and got to work. Tim had helped design the tower security, so he knew exactly which wires to cut with the scissors and which to switch carefully to other positions with the forceps. The team should have known better than to lock him in using his own security system.

There was a click as the lock slid back from the door. Success. He sealed the panel back up as best as he could. He could always come fix it later when he had the proper tools.

Tim stood up slowly, minding his various injuries, and walked to the door. He turned the handle and pushed, but the door was stuck. It wouldn’t swing open. Tim looked out into the hallway again, but he still didn’t see anything. The display on the door indicated that it was no longer locked. It should have been able to open.

Then, Tim carefully stood up on his toes and straight looked down out the window on the door to see a chair propped up against the other side of the handle. It was positioned in such a way that the handle on the door could not be fully turned downwards, so the door could not be opened.

Ah. So the team _had_ known better than to only lock Tim in with the security system that he had designed. Tim couldn’t believe that after dismantling his top tier security system to escape, he was thwarted by a simple chair.

Tim began looking for alternative exits. There was always the window, but without his gear, he didn’t have an easy way to navigate the twenty stories to the ground. Besides that, his options were limited to somehow creating a hole in the wall or attempting to somehow jostle the chair away from the door.

All of this was ridiculous though, Tim wasn’t escaping from the clutches of some evildoer. He had been locked in by his friends for some reason, and all he needed was an explanation.

So, Tim went back to the door and began jostling it as much as he could to try and make enough noise to signal to someone that he was awake. Then, he remembered the security camera in the room. There was no audio input on the camera, but maybe someone was watching it? Tim waved his arms in front of the camera as much as he could while minding his aches and pains.

Tim heard a _whoosh_ in the hallway as Bart’s face appeared at the window on the door.

“Aww man I’m sorry I was supposed to be watching for when you woke up but I got distracted by my game,” Bart said, yelling to make sure that Tim could hear him through the door.

“What is going on?” Tim asked, also having to yell. The door was remarkably thick.

Bart began yelling very quickly, “Uh so we talked to the guy and he wouldn’t tell us what he did only that he did do something to you and then he did the evil laugh that a lot of bad guys do that is soooo overplayed by this point but basically we don’t know what’s wrong with you only that there is something wrong and we have to keep an eye on you until we figure it out.”

Tim blinked as his mind processed Bart’s very quickly spoken words. So, the magic _had_ done something to Tim? Strange, he didn’t feel any different. Of course, it’s possible that he couldn’t know if there was anything wrong because the spell could have affected his memory too. There was also the possibility that the magic had a trigger word or something, and it just hadn’t been triggered yet. Which meant there was still every possibility Tim could turn into a chicken. He shuddered at that thought.

“Are you going to keep me trapped in here then?” Tim asked.

“No, we were just waiting for you to wake up. We’re supposed to take turns watching you from now on until we figure out what happened,” Bart replied as he pulled the chair on the other side of the door away from the handle. He swung the door open and let Tim out.

Tim stepped out of the room and then looked at Bart, puzzled. “Why the chair and the locked door?” he asked.

“That was my idea,” Bart replied, “Just in case you woke up mind controlled and went all ninja on us.”

Tim knitted his eyebrows, “How do you know I’m not being controlled right now?”

“Well, I guess I don’t. But you’re not acting like you are,” Bart responded, “You seem like you and not like, a robot or something.”

“Fair enough,” Tim supposed. If the roles had been reversed, Tim would have been doing many more tests right now to ensure that everything checked out. But the roles were not reversed, and considering Tim wasn’t even sure of his own mind right now, so he would have to trust the team’s judgement.

“Alright I’m supposed to wake Cassie now. She said she would take the shift after you woke up,” Bart replied as he started down the hall, walking at a normal pace to allow Tim to follow.

Tim trailed just a bit behind Bart. “What time is it?” he asked.

“I dunno, somewhere around 3 am I think,” Bart replied, “You were asleep for a few hours.”

Tim realized the team must be serious about this monitoring thing if it’s going to be 24/7. This can’t be sustainable for a long period of time. They would have to do something else eventually. Tim decided that he would talk with Cassie about it, perhaps see if they can get someone experienced with magic to come check him out and fix whatever is wrong with him.

Bart and Tim reached Cassie’s door and Bart gave it a light knock. A few moments later, the door swung open to reveal Cassie in her sleep wear.

“Hey look, he’s awake,” Bart said with a flourish, while gesturing to Tim.

Cassie sighed disappointedly, “I was hoping he would be asleep for longer.”

“You should have known I wouldn’t,” Tim replied.

“No, I knew you wouldn’t be asleep for too long. I was just hoping. It’s as if your body actively rejects any form of rest. A medical marvel actually,” Cassie replied with a hint of sarcasm. She turned to Bart and said, “Alright, I’ve got it from here.”

“Cool thanks,” Bart said before zipping away.

“So, we’re really doing this?” Tim asked Cassie, “The 24/7 monitoring? That’s not sustainable and you know it.”

“Of course I know,” Cassie replied, “I already put a call out to Zatanna. She’s currently preoccupied but she said she should be able to swing by in a couple of days.”

Ah. Bart had failed to mention that. At least there was a plan, even if it involved his every movement being watched for a few days. The good news was that he wasn’t due back in Gotham for a bit. As long as Zatanna came by fairly soon, everything should work out.

“Give me a sec to change clothes and then we can go find a place to start working,” Cassie said, “I’m assuming you are going to want to work on something?”

Tim nodded. He was going to have to push through his headache, but he had to get to the bottom of everything. Plus, he probably had some Wayne Enterprises work that needed to be done too.

When Cassie said for Tim to wait “a sec,” she truly did mean that it wouldn’t take long. Blessings of having superhuman abilities, you can do things fast. Next thing Tim knew, she was dressed, ready, and standing at the door.

“Alright, lead the way,” Cassie said.

Tim was fairly certain that Cassie knew exactly where he was going to go. He wanted to talk to the guy who did this to him. Not that he didn’t trust the team, but Tim was the more experienced interrogator and he wanted to speak to the man himself.

Tim did make sure to take a pit stop at the equipment storage before heading that direction, to put on the rest of his costume again. Can’t be having crazy supervillains know his identity, right? Besides the ones that already do that is, because there were already quite a few. Tim really didn’t care to add a new member to the club. Some of the members of the group, namely Ra’s al Ghul, had already made his life more difficult.

Cassie waited just outside the door for Tim to finish getting his costume on. He took a lot longer than she had to get prepared, due to the complexity of his suit and the mere fact that he didn’t have any superpowers to speed the process along.

After he finished getting ready, Tim led the way down towards the holding cells where the team kept the metas and other powered individuals that they captured after battles. They always transferred them to the appropriate authorities, but the local police department was ill-prepared for containing metas. The team often had to wait until they could transfer their captured foes to a larger government agency. The side of hero work that you never saw was the bureaucracy. It was times like these that Tim missed Gotham where the GCPD could actually handle the clean-up.

“So, he’s calling himself the Fairy Man,” Cassie said as they made their way down the stairs into the containment area. Tim was having to move at a slower pace than usual due to his still aching injuries, but they were at least manageable.

Tim snickered, “The Fairy Man? Are you serious? What kind of a name is that?”

Cassie shrugged, “He’s got a few screws loose.”

Tim sighed. He truly did think that they had left their stupidly ridiculous villains behind in their Young Justice days. They used to deal with so many strange villains back then. Their first villain had been a woman who couldn’t even stand up because her boobs grew too big. There was also the guy who brainwashed an entire generation of kids to kill their parents through the kids show “Hugga-Tugga-Thuggies.” Also, there was the time they played baseball in space to help a friend. Who would’ve thought that aliens would like baseball so much?

As they drew closer to the holding cells, Tim could hear the slight rumblings of a giggle echoing through the hallway. This person was indeed a few fries shy of a Happy Meal. This unnerved Tim simply because the madder the man, the worse the potential curse that had been cast upon him. Tim was still a bit worried he would suddenly turn into a chicken.

The man appeared the same as Tim remembered from the battle. He appeared to be in his late thirties to early forties with a strong, muscular build. The top of his head was shaved, and he sported a long, dark haired beard. The most striking feature about him was the pink tutu and fake fairy wings that the man was sporting, coupled with a pair of light pink tights. Tim supposed that it did make sense that this man was using the moniker “the Fairy Man.”

“Oooh hoo hoo visitors once more, how delightful,” the Fairy Man said in a cartoonishly high pitched voice. He twirled his hands around through the air as though he was an orchestra conductor.

“Remember me?” Tim asked, using his patented BatGlare™ to stare this man down.

“Ah yes, I remember, you’re the one I blasted,” the man responded, not seeming to react to Tim’s menacing glare, “Tee hee, what fun we’re having with that aren’t we?”

“It would be more fun if you would tell me what you did,” Tim replied.

“Oh, but you haven’t noticed already? How interesting. What a twist!” the Fairy Man said gleefully as he approached the edge of the glass wall that was separating the two parties. The man had a wide smile spread across his face as he returned Tim’s gaze.

“Should I have?” Tim replied, keeping his voice level. He didn’t want this Fairy Man to know how unnerving that previous statement had been for him. Tim hadn’t noticed a thing wrong yet and he had been operating under the assumption that whatever had been cast upon him hadn’t been triggered yet. Nothing so far had seemed out of the ordinary for Tim, and even Bart had said that Tim seemed normal.

“You should have realized the moment you woke up,” the Fairy Man said before breaking out into an uncontrollable bout of laughter.

Tim and Cassie exchanged a look. Her face was a mix of worry and confusion. Tim knew that Cassie could see the same emotions behind his own eyes but he steeled them before turning back to face their imprisoned lunatic.

“Tell. Me. What. You. Did.” Tim said, nearly growling out the words one by one.

“Where’s the fun in that?” the man answered, between giggles, “I’d like to see how this plays out.”

Cassie put a hand on Tim’s shoulder, prompting him to turn to face her.

“He’s not going to tell you anything,” she said, “We already tried too, remember?”

Tim scowled. He wasn’t happy about it, but Cassie was right. He’d dealt with enough lunatics in Gotham before to recognize the signs of an absurdly mad man. People who lack all sanity also lack incentives to talk, making interrogating them near impossible without heavy tactics, which would cross too many lines. The fact of the matter was, there was nothing Tim could threaten this man with that would outweigh his desire to play whatever twisted or goofy game he had concocted.

“You’re right,” Tim said, turning to walk away, “Unfortunately.”

As Tim started to leave, he heard The Fairy Man call out and say, “Going so soon? But the fun was just starting.” The Fairy Man then burst into a high-pitched laughter that continued to echo in the stairwell as Tim and Cassie left the holding area. Smug bastard.

“It’s alright,” Cassie said to Tim, trying to be reassuring as they climbed up the stairwell, “We’ll get to the bottom of this.”

Tim nodded, “I know. I’d just rather it be sooner than later.”

Cassie replied, “For what it’s worth, you don’t seem any different.”

“Funny, Bart said the same thing,” Tim said, “I just hate not knowing what’s going on.”

“Well, for now how about we head up to the lounge and put on a movie or something,” Cassie suggested.

“As long as I can work through the movie,” Tim said.

Cassie sighed, “I’m not going to be able to talk you out of that, will I?”

Tim just gave her a grin as he steered their course towards the direction of his room. He needed a change of clothes anyways. They walked down the hall until they reached Tim’s room. Cassie waited outside the door as Tim changed out of his costume and grabbed his laptop. He was sure that he had only about a million work emails to answer and a hundred spreadsheets to pour through. But first, he was going to do all the research that he could on this Fairy Man character as well as common effects of magic so that he could quickly identify any signs within himself.

Tim and Cassie walked to the living room area just next to the kitchen. Tim settled down with his laptop on his recliner as Cassie set up the TV.

“Any movie preferences?” she asked Tim.

Tim shrugged, “Just nothing with magic. It’s a little too on the nose right now.”

Cassie chuckled, “Understood. I was thinking the same thing.”

Cassie ended up selecting a cheesy comedy about a con artist trying to pretend that he was some rich family’s long lost cousin in order to gain access to their fortune. However, along the way, he learns that the true wealth in life is family. It was goofy and light-hearted, and helped distract Tim from his current predicament.

Of course, he only half paid attention to the movie, as the rest of his focus was dedicated to his research. He didn’t find anything substantial on their captured villain, just some low-level crimes. There were a few reports of nearby civilians or police officers getting smacked with magic from the Fairy Man in these events, but no reports of what happened to them afterwards. The lack of information was frustrating, but Tim kept searching. This Fairy Man character was relatively new, the first report was only a few months old, so there wasn't a plethora of past experiences to draw intel from. His true identity was also still unknown.

The con artist movie ended and Cassie replaced it with an action movie about some secret agent whose family gets kidnapped by an international terrorist organization. It was rather predictable, and therefore less interesting to Tim. He figured out the plot twist in the middle of the movie about ten scenes before it actually happened.

Over on her couch, Cassie yawned and Tim found himself yawning as well. It was nearing 7 am, and he hadn’t had any sort of stimulant like coffee to help keep him awake. Not to mention, he was still recovering from various injuries. Tim found himself struggling to keep his eyes open. He had just slept for a few hours earlier, why was his body forsaking him again?

Damn his body’s natural inclination to sleep. It always betrayed him. He tried to push through it, but he only succeeded in squeezing another 10 minutes of work before his vision blurred to the point where he could no longer read his laptop screen.

He fell asleep in his chair, computer screen still open to the case files he had previously been reading.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! I know this chapter was more build up but we’ll be getting into more of the fun stuff by the next chapter I promise. Kon wasn’t even in this chapter at all oops. He’s heavily in both of the next two I swear, just wanted Tim to have some time with Bart and Cassie and build the exposition a bit more. I did tag this fic as “slow build” for a reason. It takes some time, but we’ll get there.
> 
> The Fairy Man is an OC that I just designed for this story just to fit the narrative I wanted. I needed a magic user but I wanted him to be as ridiculous as possible cause I’m still channeling some of the OG Young Justice comics and a lot of YJ’s villains and stories were just stupidly ridiculous. I’m personally not a huge fan of the way he came out, I don’t think he’s all that creative tbh, but he’s not supposed to be the main focus of the story, I just needed him for my narrative.
> 
> Also my characterizations keep flying out the window I stg. I keep telling myself, don't write Tim as a coffee addicted workaholic because that's not how he really is but it keeps sneaking into my writing. But then I tell myself, this was supposed to be a silly, stupid drabble that turned into a longer fic lmao.
> 
> Anyways, feel free to hit me up on my Twitter or Tumblr, @scarletbirbs. I'm more active on Tumblr, and you can follow me for shitty memes and hot takes if you want.


	3. when the floodgates opened, we cried an ocean

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I’m back. I know it’s been a while but I had finals and two papers and two projects that were all due this week but I’m dooooone with the semester now so I have time to actually work on this. I’m sticking by my promise to be done with this by mid to late December. I mean, there's only one chapter left after this chapter so it should be achievable.
> 
> Also, how many times can I start a chapter with Tim waking up from sleep? Answer: more often than you fuckin think. It’s lazy writing, I know but I kinda like to let my stories take me along for the ride and not vice versa. I write what makes sense in my mind for what I’ve done and where I want to go and Tim getting a lot of sleep just happened to be on the menu. But he deserves it y’know? Let the boy sleep  
> .  
> Chapter four does not start like that, I promise. This chapter we start getting into the fun stuff (less build up finally). Hope y’all enjoy!

Tim woke up to a sinister sunbeam streaming through the window and striking right across his eyes. How cruel of the sun to shine so brightly directly onto his face. He was still sitting in the lounging chair that he had been stationed in when he and Cassie had settled down for a movie. Tim’s laptop was resting on his legs but was tilted to the side and resting against the arm rest, as his grip on the machine had relaxed in his sleep. According to the clock on his computer, he had only been asleep for about an hour and a half.

Crazy. Tim had multiple occasions of sleep in one day that were not simply twenty-minute power naps. He must have set a new record for himself. Maybe the curse put on him simply made him sleep the amount that a normal person would.

Cassie was curled up on the couch next to Tim’s chair. She was snoozing softly. Tim debated waking her up. On one hand, she was supposed to be keeping an eye on Tim. On the other hand, she had looked truly exhausted after everything that happened in the past twenty-four hours, and it seemed like she really needed the rest.

Luckily, his ruminations were rendered moot when he heard Kon shuffle into the kitchen area adjacent to the living room. It must be Kon’s turn to keep an eye on Tim by now. Kon is the only one who slept the whole night after all. At least, it definitely seemed like Kon had slept well. His hair was unkempt and he was dressed in loose sleep clothes. Kon let out a yawn as he started opening cabinets to make his breakfast.

Tim opened his mouth to call out a greeting to Kon but was stopped by his heart suddenly leaping into his throat. It began beating at the tempo that Tim would expect from a difficult battle out in the field. A feeling similar to an adrenaline rush began lighting up his veins but it was less of a stress-induced rush and more like something else. He wasn’t sure how to explain it other than his body was on fire with some sort of feeling that Tim just couldn’t quite place.

Of course, Tim had known that he had some sort of feelings for Kon for some time. However, Tim had mastered the art of emotional repression. You don’t work with Batman for a long period of time without learning a thing or two about that. He kept those emotions tucked neatly away right beside the loss of his parents in the “things we don’t think about” locked vault in his mind. His emotions for Kon hadn’t smacked him like this since well, since Kon had come back from the dead.

“Tim, dude, you okay?” Tim heard Kon say, as Kon was waving his hands in front of Tim’s face. Tim wasn’t sure what sort of expression was on his face, but it must have been a vacant one. Tim hadn’t even noticed Kon approaching him.

“Huh? Oh yeah I’m fine. Just zoned out for a sec,” Tim replied, trying to calm his heartbeat as much as he could. Kon could probably hear it.

Kon grinned and Tim felt the world start spinning. What the fuck was happening to him? Kon smiling shouldn’t be doing this to him. What happened to the emotional suppression vault?

“Okay good, because your heart was racing and you were just staring into nothing. I was worried that maybe your magicky robot programming was kicking in and you were about to go crazy,” Kon said, still grinning. Damn him.

Tim shrugged in an effort to play everything cool despite the fact that his chest felt like it was going to burst at any moment, “Nothing has happened yet.”

“Well, I guess it’s my turn to keep an eye on you, based on…” Kon trailed off as he gestured to Cassie asleep on the couch. She had shifted so that one of her legs was leaning off the couch, almost halfway to the ground.

“Yeah I guess so,” Tim replied. All he wanted to do was run away from Kon until he could get his emotions in check. The last thing Tim needed right now was to be alone with him.

Kon frowned and it felt as though the sun had gone behind a cloud, there was a relief from the unrelenting heat but there was also a sense of ominousness of what might come next.

“You okay man?” Kon asked, with genuine concern, “You don’t seem like yourself.”

That was funny to Tim, considering both Cassie and Bart had said that he had seemed the same since he was whammied by magic. But to be fair, Tim hadn’t had any strange emotional reactions with them like he had just now. Maybe it was because he had finally gotten some sleep. Tim thrived on maintaining a forward momentum and never taking the time to wallow in any sort of emotion. Perhaps his excess rest opened up the metaphorical Pandora’s Box that Tim had been keeping buried.

“I’m fine, I just think I need to get some work done,” Tim said.

Kon did not look convinced by that response, but he didn’t try to refute it.

“Alright well, I’m going to make some breakfast and you can just keep working right there if you want. After breakfast maybe I can convince you to take a break and play some video games?” Kon posed the phrase as a question, but he sounded more like a begging puppy. Tim raised his gaze to meet Kon’s and immediately realized his mistake. Kon’s eyes were staring intently, exploring Tim’s, searching for the response from Tim that he wanted to hear.

Tim sighed, he was too weak to refuse, “Sure.”

Kon brightened up at Tim’s reply and took off for the kitchen to throw together some food. Tim could hear cabinets opening and dishes clattering as they were set on the countertop. Cassie shuffled a bit on the couch at the noise, but her eyes remained firmly closed.

Tim took the moment alone to regain his composure. He employed some meditation techniques that he had learned during his Robin training to clear his mind. The last thing he needed right now was for some buried feelings ruining his friendship with his best friend. Whatever the hell that just was is going back down deep. Tim concentrated on his breathing. Inhale. Hold. Exhale. Repeat. He felt his heart beat slow as his mind stabilized. Everything was going to be okay.

Tim heard footsteps as Kon creeped up behind him. Tim opened his eyes and turned his head to see Kon sheepishly holding two bowls of cereal.

“Sorry,” Kon said quietly, “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“It’s alright,” Tim replied, “I was done.”

Kon held out one bowl of cereal to Tim, “Here, I’m betting you haven’t eaten anything in a while.”

Kon was right, of course. Basic self-maintenance tended to fall to the wayside for Tim when there were more pressing matters at hand. He hadn’t even noticed his hunger until this moment when Kon brought it up. Just then, his stomach growled as if to prove a point.

“Thanks,” Tim said, as he grabbed the bowl from Kon. Kon sat down on a chair next to Tim’s and began digging into his own bowl of cereal.

Neither one of them spoke for a while after that, which was fine with Tim. Kon was focused on his cereal, and Tim was continuing to look at case files about their crazy villain, while taking the occasional bite out of his own bowl. It was nice to simply enjoy each other’s company for a moment, without their usual light-hearted quips and jabs. Tim half expected Kon to speak up at any second, as he was rarely this quiet for this long. Perhaps he was trying to be quiet to avoid waking up Cassie.

Tim heard a “clank” as Kon’s spoon clattered against the rim of his bowl.

“Alright,” Kon said, “Ready for that break now?”

Tim simply pointed at his own bowl of cereal which was not quite empty, although moderately soggy by now.

Kon pouted, “Man, why can’t you eat more quick?”

“Quickly,” Tim said pointedly, not even raising his head to look at Kon. Kon stuck out his tongue and blew a raspberry at Tim. Tim gave a quick glance to Kon and smirked before returning his gaze to his computer. By this point, Tim couldn’t tell if Kon was legitimately forgetting to use the right word or if he was just doing it on purpose to be obnoxious.

Tim turned his attention back to his work. Unfortunately for him, Kon was a master of being a moderate annoyance until he got his way. Kon dropped his empty bowl off in the sink and then went and stood right behind Tim’s chair, looming over Tim’s head. It was admittedly harder for Tim to concentrate, especially when Kon put his elbows right on top of Tim’s head and rested his own head on his upturned palms. Every few seconds, Kon was sighing dramatically, his short huffs of air indicating his impatience.

“Can I help you?” Tim asked him, sarcastically. He admittedly was slightly flustered by the feeling of Kon’s arms resting on the top his head but he didn’t let that show.

“No, no just continue with your boring case files and try not to think about all of the fun we could be having right now if you weren’t such a stick in the mud,” Kon replied, matching Tim’s level of sarcasm.

“You annoying me just makes me work slower,” Tim retorted.

“Aha, so you admit that my efforts to bother you are working,” Kon replied, sounding victorious.

Tim let out an annoyed groan. He could practically feel Kon’s triumphant smile above him. Damn him. Tim wasn’t going to be able to do anything with all of this distraction. He didn’t want to concede, but he knew that Kon’s efforts would just get worse and worse and Tim wasn’t sure if he could keep everything under wraps if they went too far.

Tim lowered the screen on his laptop. Kon let out a victorious hoot and then remembered Cassie still asleep on the couch and quickly lowered his voice. Kon gestured to the door and they both tiptoed out of the room to avoid waking Cassie. Well, Tim tiptoed. Kon simply floated. He even did a flip in midair as if to rub in the fact that he could fly while Tim lacked that ability. Not that Tim needed any reminders, as he had hitched a ride on Air Kon many times in the past when the team needed to fly to a mission.

“Alright, what are we doing?” Tim asked when they reached the hallway.

“How about I kick your ass in Mario Kart?” Kon said with a grin.

Tim rolled his eyes, “I mean we can play Mario Kart but I believe I’ll be the one doing the ass-kicking.”

Kon scoffed, “In your dreams.”

They made their way down the hall towards another media room. The Tower was truly expansive and had rooms for everything. Training areas, living quarters, and back-up media rooms for when your friend was napping in the main living room.

Kon continued to float around Tim, making gloating faces and blowing raspberries in a teasing way.

“Enjoying yourself?” Tim asked him, sarcasm dripping from his words.

“Very much, thank you for asking,” Kon replied, smugly.

Tim smiled, but only slightly so that Kon couldn’t see his expression. Kon was too caught up in his pursuit of being a general nuisance to notice anyways. Things were always so easy between them. Tim could let his guard down around Kon in a way that he never truly could with anyone else. He did his best to maintain a calm, cool exterior, but in reality he was constantly worried about something or another. He would be worried about a case, about his responsibilities in his real identity, or he’d be worried about his position in the world. After Dick had kicked him out like he was nothing and tried to get him to go to therapy when he believed that Bruce was alive, Tim felt even less secure in his position in the family. They had made amends, but it showed Tim just how expendable he truly was. He couldn’t take anything for granted.

But with Kon, Tim never had to worry about his position with him. They had always had each other’s backs, no matter what. When it felt like everyone hadn’t believed Tim and turned their back on him, Kon had been the one person who believed him. The one person who had stood by him and hadn’t abandoned him. Tim felt safe with Kon in a way that he couldn’t with anybody else. Being with Kon made him feel like everything that made him anxious was going to be okay.

The only thing that was not okay was the feelings he had been repressing. Tim didn’t want to ruin the relationship they did have by bringing in messy emotions. It was better to have something with Kon than nothing, even if it wasn’t the something that Tim wanted.

They reached the door to the secondary media room and Kon finally lowered himself down to settle his feet on the ground. When they entered, Kon went to turn on the TV and the game station while Tim searched for their copy of Mario Kart in the cabinets. Once the game was set up, they settled side by side on the couch, close, but still at a comfortable distance for two friends playing video games.

Tim won the first match fairly easily, leading Kon to claim that “he just needed to warm up.” In the second race, a computer character ended up winning because Kon and Tim were too busy trying to bump each other off of the road on a bridge close to the finish line that they didn’t notice the computer characters crossing the finish. The third race went to Kon, who hit Tim with a blue shell in the last lap, knocking Tim back enough for Kon to scoop the win in the end.

There was one race left in their round, and the two of them were tied with one victory a piece. Both were intently focused on the game, and were making exaggerated driving motions across the couch to try and throw the other person off. They were pushing on each other’s shoulders and occasionally swatting at the other person’s controller to try and get them to mess up.

In the second lap, Tim hit Kon with a red tortoise shell, allowing him to take the lead. Kon then began shoving even harder into Tim with his shoulder, which led to an intense shoulder battle between the two of them.

“Hey, stop pushing,” Tim said indignantly.

“Not until I win,” Kon replied with a grin, his eyes locked on the screen.

They entered the final lap and the two of them were miles ahead of the computer characters, but neck and neck with each other. Kon tried to throw a banana peel at Tim but missed. Both were still making excessive movements with their controllers to try and break the other’s concentration.

Kon had slightly edged out Tim going into the final turn, so in an instinctive act of desperation, Tim made an exaggerated left turn with his controller right in front of Kon’s face. He underestimated his force, however, and his movement led to him falling right onto Kon’s lap.

Tim heard Kon’s breath hitch as Kon hesitated just enough for Tim to get his character across the finish line first. The screen erupted in confetti, signaling Tim’s victory.

“Yes! I won!” Tim exclaimed, pumping his fist as he carefully pushed himself off of Kon’s thighs, “Sorry about falling by the way, I miscalculated the force of that movem-.”

The rest of the word sunk back into Tim’s throat as he saw Kon’s face. Kon looked stunned, his mouth was slightly agape and he was still staring at the screen, unblinking. A light smattering of pink dusted his cheekbones. Was he blushing or was Tim just imagining things?

“Hey, uh, you okay?” Tim asked, concerned.

Kon snapped out of his stupor, “Uh yeah, I’m-.”

Kon was interrupted by Cassie suddenly barging into the room like a woman on a mission. She looked somewhere between concerned and absolutely panicked.

“Oh thank Zeus, you two are here,” she said, breathless, “When I woke up and didn’t see Tim, I was worried he had gone crazy and was like, hiding in the rafters waiting to pounce.”

“Sorry, we didn’t mean to worry you,” Tim said, “Kon took over guard duty and we figured it would be best to let you sleep.”

“It’s alright,” Cassie said, “Just next time leave a note or something.”

“Copy that,” Tim replied.

With that, Cassie exited the room, leaving Tim and Kon alone with their game once more.

Tim looked over at Kon, who looked more composed than before, “You sure you’re alright?” he asked.

“Yeah I’m fine, I just couldn’t believe that you beat me,” Kon replied, seemingly trying to sound teasingly annoyed, but his voice seemed a bit too flat to Tim.

“Well it just goes to show that I’m the best at Mario Kart,” Tim replied lightheartedly, trying to bring the mood back up.

“Yeah, well you cheated,” Kon said, starting to sound more like himself.

Tim let out an exaggerated gasp, “Did not.”

“Did too.”

“Well, I guess we’ll just have to rematch to make sure,” Tim said.

“You’re on.”

They continued playing Mario Kart for a few hours, until Bart came to relieve Kon of guard duty. Kon won some games, Tim won some games, but both of them lost count by the end. But for Tim, it didn’t really matter. He was too busy analyzing Kon’s earlier reaction. He couldn’t tell if he was reading too far into things, or if there was the possibility that Kon might reciprocate his feelings.

No. There was no way. Nothing in any of their years spent together as friends and teammates gave any indication that Kon was anything but straight. Tim had done the analysis a million times before, hoping to find a different result but the answer was always a resounding no. He would just have to be okay with Kon being his best friend. That was all he could do.

Bart took over Kon’s controller and Kon absconded quickly after that, relieved from his job of watching Tim. It was probably for the best for both of them, Tim tried to convince himself. Best to ignore the situation from earlier.

There were more pressing matters at hand than some stupid feelings, like whether or not Tim was going to turn into a chicken from this magic spell. Which, seemed rather unlikely since the Fairy Man had said that he should have already noticed, and as far as Tim could tell, he had not yet sprouted any feathers. Everything else would just have to take a backseat until they resolved this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The idea that I used for inspiration for this chapter was just:  
> Kon: *exists*  
> Tim: Fuck  
> With that “fuck” having multiple meanings. It’s such a versatile word. Also, I took into consideration how they are both such dorks that annoy each other but also take care of each other when the other is having a rough go of things. I also totally projected my flirting style, that is, to relentlessly tease the object of your affection in order to hide the deeper feelings, onto the two of them but I feel like it’s in character for their dynamic anyways.
> 
> Also, can I ever write a story where Tim and Kon don’t play video games together? Probably not. It’s a fun dynamic to explore.
> 
> A lot of the events I referenced in this chapter hail from Tim’s Red Robin series and Conner’s last Superboy series before the New 52 fucked everything up. I still resent the New 52 so much for what it did to my various favorite characters. None of them were treated well :(
> 
> Anyways, I digress. I’m continuing the invitation to hit me up on Tumblr or Twitter @scarletbirbs for both, but I’m more active on Tumblr. Chapter 4 is still in the works but I want to have it up in a week or so as long as I can finish it. Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed!


	4. just let your heart speak up, and i'll know

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it, the last chapter. I’ve been working on this fic since September, believe it or not. I feel oddly proud of this chapter, despite the fact that writing super fluffy stuff is really hard for me. (Mostly because I have literally no romantic experiences of my own to draw from). But I hope I did a good job. Y’all feel free to let me know down in those comments. Also, I lied I know I said the fic was >13k but it ended up being a little shorter after edits and stuff but hey it’s fine lol. This was supposed to be a short drabble but ended up being a multi-chapter fic that I wrote off and on over a span of like three months so, expectations are not always reality lmao.
> 
> But anyways, hope you enjoy the conclusion of this fic!

The next few days passed without much incident. Cassie, Bart, and Kon continued taking turns watching over Tim. Tim used some of the time to continue his research on their crazy villain who was still sitting in their holding cells. However, he eventually hit a wall where there was simply no more information for him to digest, which was frustrating. He also did some research to assist Oracle, who had been given a whole ton of requests in the past week from various fellow vigilante friends. Tim had all of this extra time confined to the watchful eye of his friends, so he might as well use it to help her out.

Cassie and Bart were usually okay with letting Tim do his own thing when it was their turn to watch him. Bart was usually too distracted by something else anyways to really keep a watchful eye on Tim and Cassie knew how to give him just enough space. They both still performed their duty, but they both gave him some room.

Kon, on the other hand, always wanted to do something together when it was his turn for guard duty. Tim figured it was boredom, as Kon was not content to just sit and watch TV while Tim worked. Tim had tried, but Kon kept talking through the movie and asking Tim questions about it. Kon always wanted to go somewhere and do something. He wanted to go into town and go to the arcade, he wanted to walk along the beach, he wanted to go to a sports game, etc.

Tim shot down most of Kon’s ideas, especially because Tim didn’t want to go anywhere near a crowd in the off chance that he suddenly started attacking or going crazy from whatever magic had been placed on him. Tim still hadn’t noticed any differences, but there was always the chance that there was a trigger word or something that would set him off.

They never discussed Kon’s weirdness from the other day when they had been playing video games. Neither one of them really wanted to talk about it, so they never brought it up. It was like it hadn’t happened.

They did spend one afternoon away from the tower, on the beach. Tim agreed to that idea with the caveat that they find a private spot away from other people. It wasn’t until they had reached the beach that Tim realized his mistake. The two of them alone wearing nothing but swim trunks was a terrible combination for Tim’s heart.

Kon was attractive, that much was always clear by the amount of attention he got from all sorts of people. There was always a gaggle of girls trying to get his attention, wherever he went. Not to mention all of the online websites and forums that existed that were dedicated to Superboy and his good looks.

But as they were seated on the sand of the beach watching the sun set across the water, Tim thought that Kon looked ethereal. The dying rays of the sun danced across his skin, creating the illusion that Kon was glowing. He always looked best in the light of the sun, most likely due in part to his Kryptonian physiology. The two of them were opposites in that regard. Tim thrived in the shadows and stayed out of the limelight. Kon shined in the spotlight, surrounded by the adoration of other people.

Tim felt a pang of satisfaction that none of the fans in the online forums got to see Kon like this. Even if Tim never got to act on his feelings, this moment was one that he could treasure just for himself.

Kon’s gaze was locked on the orange sun lowering across the water. Tim tried not to make his staring too apparent but trying to peel his eyes away from Kon was like trying to rip off a bandage.

It was the first time in a long time that Tim felt some semblance of peace. No cases looming over his head, no supervillains trying to kill him or recruit him, and for a time he forgot about the spell that was supposed to do something to him. He could even pretend for a bit that they were something more than friends. In this moment, it was just him and Kon, talking about everything and nothing, enjoying the sunset as the waves swirled softly in the background. He wished he could live in that moment forever.

However, the moment was ruined by Kon suddenly splashing Tim in the face with water, which spurred a massive water fight that ended with Tim complaining that Kon was cheating by flying out of range. That had been a good day, a happy day. Neither of them had wanted to leave, even as the sun went down completely. They stayed on the beach well into Bart’s Tim-watching shift without noticing, only realizing it when Bart sped onto the shore to let them know that they had been due back at the tower two hours ago.

As the days passed, Tim became less certain that anything was even wrong. He didn’t feel any different from before. The logical part of his brain would then remind him that there was no way to tell if his memories had been altered by the magic, but it would have had to have been extremely thorough. All of his memories lined up and nothing seemed different about him. The only difference was that Tim found it harder to control his feelings for Kon. His feelings had existed before the magic, of that much Tim was certain. Tim had just always kept them repressed because he didn’t want them to get in the way of their friendship. But there were many possibilities that could explain this shift, such as the fact that Tim was getting more sleep than usual or that he was spending more time alone with Kon.

The Fairy Man confirmed that whatever spell he had put on Tim had already been triggered, or at least Tim should have noticed the difference as soon as he woke up. But he hadn’t noticed a thing, and neither had the rest of his friends. They said they would tell Tim if they noticed him acting strangely, but nothing had happened.

It had been about five days since the incident that started it all, and Tim was in the lounge with Cassie when Bart rushed in and announced, “Guys, Zatanna is here.”

Tim felt the tempo of his heart increase. They were finally going to get to the bottom of this, but Tim would be lying if he said he wasn’t at least a little apprehensive to hear the results.

Cassie and Tim walked to the main foyer where they found Kon, Bart, and Zatanna waiting. Bart had run ahead (of course) and gotten there before them.

“Thanks for coming by,” Tim said to Zatanna.

“Of course,” she said, “I’m only sorry that I couldn’t get here more quickly.”

Tim explained the situation and everything that they knew at the moment to her. Bart, Kon, and Cassie contributed their observations on Tim’s behavior, but they all came to the conclusion that Tim hadn’t seemed any different. Except for Kon, who had stayed uncharacteristically silent when Bart and Cassie had agreed on that point.

“Alright, I’ll see what I can do,” Zatanna said when they had finished their explanation. She held up her hands and pointed them towards Tim. Bart, Cassie, and Kon all backed away, leaving Tim alone in the center of the room.

“Leaver eht Melborp,” Zatanna said, as she shut her eyes in concentration. A blue tinged light started shooting out of her outstretched hands and began encircling Tim. The light danced around him for a few moments, before suddenly disappearing. Zatanna opened her eyes, a look of confusion on her face.

“What happened?” Bart asked from the side.

“I’m not sure,” Zatanna replied, “That should have worked.”

“Did it not?” Cassie asked.

“No,” Zatanna responded, “Either the spell placed on him is stronger than my magic or there’s nothing wrong with him at all.”

“Well, what do we do now?” Kon asked.

Bart said, “Try again?”

Zatanna shook her head, “That would have worked if there was something I could do. Trying again won’t make a difference.”

“We can try talking to The Fairy Man again and see if he is more amenable to telling us what he hit me with now,” Tim suggested. He didn’t have any other ideas and he was beginning to feel frustrated and hopeless. Zatanna’s magic was supposed to have worked, it was supposed to have fixed this. Everything was supposed to go back to normal, no more being monitored by his friends every hour of the day.

Zatanna snickered, “The Fairy Man? Really?”

“We thought the same thing,” Tim replied, “But we don’t name the villains, they name themselves.”

“Terrible names aside, that is not a bad idea,” Zatanna replied, “Depending on how strong his magic is, I might be able to get him to tell us what he did.”

Tim nodded and the group began leading Zatanna down to the holding cells. They were fortunate that the Fairy Man hadn’t been transferred to the authorities yet, as the paperwork was still being processed. Ah, the wonders of bureaucracy.

As the door to the holding area slid open, they could hear the high pitched giggle that they had grown accustomed to in the days of holding this particular lunatic captive. Except for Zatanna, whose eyes had grown wide in disbelief. The team had warned her of the strange nature of this man, but there wasn’t really any way to prepare oneself for a man who acted like a seven year old girl living out a fairy fantasy.

“Ooh what fun, you all brought a party,” said the Fairy Man as the group approached his cell, “And a guest. Marvelous!” he said as he laid his eyes on Zatanna.

“We’re not here to party,” Tim replied, crossing his arms, “We want you to tell us what you did to me.”

The man cackled, “You mean you still haven’t figured it out? Weren’t you supposed to be a detective?”

“Why don’t you answer the question?” Zatanna said, “Or I can drag the truth from you.”

The Fairy Man sniffed the air, “Ah yes, I can smell the magic on you. It’s quite wonderful.” He shrugged and said, “It’s no matter by this point, the spell would have worn off by now. It was only supposed to last about a day or two.”

Tim looked confused, “What do you mean, ‘worn off?’”

The Fairy Man made a pouting face, “You ruined it by never noticing. That’s no fun. You were supposed to fall madly in love with the first thing that you saw upon awakening. It was going to be marvelous and hilarious, you running around pursuing something ridiculous like a bird or a spoon for a day or so. Instead, you ruined the show.” The man crossed his arms like a toddler who had been denied candy from a parent.

Tim’s mind began to whir. He recalled the scene from the med bay, when he had first woken up after the battle. What had been the first thing that he saw?

“Maybe the spell didn’t work?” Bart suggested, “He never seemed any different and he definitely didn’t fall in love with a spoon.”

The Fairy Man put a hand on his hip. “Are you challenging my abilities? I’m hurt. I thought we were friends,” he pouted.

Tim suddenly remembered. The first thing he had seen had been Kon. He had corrected Kon’s grammar.

Tim looked over to see Kon staring right back at him. Their eyes met, and Tim knew that Kon had figured it out too. He was always smarter than most people gave him credit for.

“I think it did work,” Kon said quietly.

“Huh?” Cassie said confusedly, turning around. She noticed the locked gazes of Tim and Kon. “Oh,” she breathed, a look of realization on her face.

“What? What? What is it?” Bart asked energetically, “Did he actually fall in love with a spoon?”

Cassie grabbed Bart by the collar and started steering him towards the door, “We’re going to give them a minute.”

“Wait why? Did he fall in love with a fork instead? A bird? A lightbulb?” Bart kept rattling on as Cassie dragged him out of the room. Zatanna followed, the hint of a small smile on her face. The door closed behind her with a clang.

“We should probably go somewhere a little more private to have this conversation,” Tim said, gesturing to the Fairy Man, who had his face pressed against the glass of his cell, his breath causing condensation to form on the wall.

“Don’t be a party pooper,” The Fairy Man said, “I want to watch.”

“Not today,” Kon said, before turning to face Tim, “Lead the way.”

Tim led them up the stairs and into a small, unoccupied room. It was one of the spare bedrooms in the tower that they had either to house guests or to use in the case that their team expanded their membership. But for now, it was uninhabited.

Tim took his mask off and set it on the desk in the corner of the room. Kon sat down on the bed as Tim pulled out the desk chair, angled it so that he was facing Kon, and took a seat. They both sat in silence, not making eye contact. Neither one of them wanted to be the first to speak, and the tension was palpable.

“So, uh. It was me huh? The first thing you saw, I mean,” Kon eventually stammered, breaking the silence.

“Yeah,” Tim responded softly.

“Serves you right huh? For correcting my grammar,” Kon attempted to joke to break the tension.

Tim let out a nervous chuckle, a slight smile curving on his face, “Yeah, I guess so.”

“I mean, there are worse things you could have fallen in love with. Like a chicken…or, or a cow,” Kon said.

“Are all of your examples farm animals?” Tim asked. “Farm boy,” he added teasingly.

“No,” Kon responded indignantly, “Just…those were.”

Tim smiled and let out an amused huff of air from his nose.

“I thought something was off,” Kon continued with a more serious tone, “Not enough to be alarming but just seemed a little off from your usual self.”

“Funny,” Tim said, “Cassie and Bart both thought the opposite. They said I seemed the same.”

Kon shook his head, “You didn’t really seem different, you just seemed more…tense? I mean, tenser than usual. You on a good day are as tightly wound as a spring. This was more like you were actively trying to repress something.”

“Maybe I was,” Tim replied.

“I mean I get it now, you were repressing whatever that spell did to you. That’s why I tried so hard to get you out of the tower, the only day that you seemed even somewhat okay was when we went to the beach,” Kon continued, “But what I don’t get is that your tension continued well past the period that the spell was supposed to last.”

Tim internally cursed. Damn Kon for being this perceptive. Most people tended to overlook Kon’s perceptiveness, especially if their impression of him was based on his brash younger years. But Kon had the uncanny knack to be able to read Tim like a book. He noticed the things that Tim didn’t say, or at least could see through the cracks in any façade Tim portrayed.

“I was just stressed about what Zatanna would find,” Tim explained, “Finding out what the spell was had been looming over my head for days.”

Kon brought his gaze up, his eyes locking with Tim’s, “Don’t lie to me. You deal with stuff worse than this on a near daily basis. That couldn’t have been it.”

“I don’t know what else it would have been.”

“I’m pretty sure you do. You always know everything.”

Tim stood up, “What do you want me to say?” he said, his voice raising as he paced around the room, “I don’t know what kind of explanation would sate you.”

“Yes, you do,” Kon replied, “The truth.”

“Please, don’t make me do that,” Tim said, shaking his head. No matter how much he trusted Kon, this was the one thing that Tim couldn’t tell him. This was the one thing that could ruin their entire friendship.

“Since when did we keep secrets from each other?” Kon said, a hint of anger beginning to creep into his voice, “I thought we had outgrown that. I thought we always had each other’s backs.”

“We do,” Tim said.

“Then why won’t you tell me?” Kon asked.

Tim sighed and ran a hand through his hair, “It’s personal. Can you just let it go?”

Kon paused for a moment to think before replying, “Alright, fine. I hope you realize I’m just worried about you man. When you start withdrawing and keeping things to yourself, you get really dark. I’m just trying to look out for you.”

Kon was right. Tim would never forget that period when he had gone around the world searching for Bruce. It was the loneliest time of his life, as well as the darkest. He felt like no one had his back, because no one believed him when he said that Bruce was alive. Dick had even wanted him to go to therapy. Tim made some morally ambiguous decisions during that time (if you could describe teaming up with an international terrorist organization as simply “morally ambiguous”). He hadn’t cared if he lived or died, as long as he got the job done in the end.

The only person who had believed Tim when he said that Bruce was alive had been Kon. Kon always had his back. Kon had been the only light in that dark time for Tim.

It dawned on Tim that he owed Kon the truth, even if it would be the hardest thing that Tim had ever done. Supervillains didn’t scare him as much as expressing these feelings did. But Kon was right, they were supposed to have each other’s backs, and it’s hard to have someone’s back when you are keeping major things from them. Tim was used to keeping secrets, it was just a part of his life. However, if there was ever anyone that Tim would feel safe baring his soul to, it would be Kon.

“You’re right,” Tim started, “I owe you the truth.”

“I know I was giving you crap just a second ago, but you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want. I just want to make sure that you are okay,” Kon said.

“No, it’s okay. You deserve to know,” Tim said, “Just promise not to think any differently of me after I tell you.”

“I mean, as long as you aren’t secretly an axe murderer, I think we’re good,” Kon replied, his tone indicating that he was trying to lighten the mood just a bit. Then, he noticed the serious expression covering Tim’s face and sobered up. Kon leaned forward and waited for Tim to speak.

“So, um, the reason that it seemed that I was still repressing something even after the spell wore off is because I was,” Tim said, hesitantly.

“And the thing that you were repressing was feelings for me, right?” Kon asked.

Tim nodded.

Kon looked confused, “Did the spell last longer than it was supposed to?”

Tim shook his head, “I don’t think so.”

Realization dawned on Kon’s face, “So that means?” he said.

“Yeah,” Tim said.

Kon was silent for what felt like an eternity to Tim. He could tell that Kon was deep in thought, but he wanted Kon to say something, say anything. Anything was better than the uncertainty of this moment. A million possible outcomes were flying through Tim’s head and he just needed resolution of some kind, even if it was bad.

Finally, Kon spoke up, “At least you’re not an axe murderer.”

Tim huffed out breath he didn’t realize he was holding as some of the tension melted from his chest, “No, not yet. There’s still time though,” he joked.

Kon laughed, “Let’s not.”

“So, I know that was a big bomb to drop on you,” Tim said, getting serious once more, “But I hope we can still be friends. It doesn’t have to mean anything.”

Kon looked down at his hands, which were resting with his fingers intertwined on his lap. He hesitated for a moment before speaking, “You’re completely sure that the spell didn’t just last longer than expected, right?”

Tim felt his heart drop. Kon wanted to blame the whole thing on the spell and forget about it. He was trying to use the excuse that the magic had caused this whole thing, so they could just put it behind them and forget. Tim had two options in this junction. He could pretend that the spell had simply lasted longer than it should have, and they could pretend that Tim never had real feelings for Kon. Everything would go back to normal. Or, he could confess that his feelings existed long before some magic dredged them up from the locked vault that he had been keeping them inside.

Tim had come this far, and he really didn’t want to keep any more secrets from Kon, let alone lie to him.

“Yeah, I’m sure,” Tim replied, “I kind of had those feelings before the spell even happened.”

Kon’s eyes widened. “Oh,” he breathed.

“But like I said, it doesn’t have to mean anythi-,” Tim started.

“No,” Kon interrupted, “It’s okay.”

“So, we can just move on from this?” Tim asked. He figured that would be the best thing for both of them. Everything was out in the open now, no more secrets, no more hiding.

Kon looked down, “I don’t want to just move on from this,” he said softly.

Tim felt confusion fall over his face, “I don’t understand.”

Kon got up from his seated position on the bed and walked over to Tim. He stopped just a couple of paces away. Tim felt his heart stutter as Kon took Tim’s hands in his own. Kon dragged his thumb along the side of Tim’s hand, and Tim felt a shiver slide down his spine.

“Do you get it now?” Kon asked, staring deep into Tim’s eyes.

Tim didn’t say anything. He felt locked in place by Kon’s gaze.

Kon continued, “Since your overanalyzing brain won’t believe me unless I spell it out for you, here goes. I like you too, in the same way. I’ve liked you for a long time. I just didn’t think you liked me back, so I never said anything.”

“Oh,” Tim breathed. Some detective he was. His feelings had been reciprocated this entire time? And he hadn’t known? It felt like something out of a cheesy romcom. But it didn’t change the fact that Kon liked him back. _Kon_ liked _him_ back. He couldn’t wrap his head around it.

“Your heart is beating quick,” Kon said, as he released one of Tim’s hands and moved his own hand upwards to rest on Tim’s chest, hovering right over Tim’s heart.

“It’s quickly,” Tim corrected as he brought one of his hands up to rest on the hand that Kon had on Tim’s chest.

Kon sighed exasperatedly, “Shut up,”

Tim smiled, taking a step closer into Kon’s space, “Make me,” he dared, looking deep into Kon’s blue eyes, challenging him. It finally hit Tim that it was okay for him to act so brazen and open like this, as well as to feel this way for Kon because _Kon liked him back._ All of those emotions that he had been repressing for ages rushed to the surface.

Tim heard Kon’s breath hitch and then Kon moved to close the rest of the space between them. They were so close now that Tim could feel Kon’s gentle exhale drift past his cheek.

Tim wasn’t sure who actually initiated the kiss, they both leaned in at the same time. The kiss started soft, a tentative glide of lips, chaste yet hinting with desire. As the seconds passed, the uncertainty faded and the intensity increased. Kon looped an arm around Tim’s lower back to pull him closer. Tim slipped his arms around Kon’s neck and dug his fingers into the hair on the back of Kon’s head.

Kon let out a pleased sigh that Tim swallowed as he dug his fingernails into the skin on the back of Kon’s neck. Tim could feel Kon’s hands traveling up and down his back as they continued with their kiss, and every movement sent sparks sliding down his spine. His heart was pounding out of his chest and every inch of his body tingled with a sensation like fire.

When they finally parted, Tim found himself panting and trying to catch some air. He wasn’t sure if it was from the kiss or if Kon simply left him breathless. His only consolation was that Kon seemed to be in the same state of disarray. His hair was disheveled from Tim’s fingers and his pupils were blown wide with desire. Tim had never seen such a look on Kon’s face. It was soft, yet hungry, as though now that he had a taste, it just wasn’t enough.

“We should do that more often,” Kon said, his gaze locked onto Tim’s.

Tim laughed, “I think we will, at least I hope we will.”

“We’d better,” Kon replied.

Tim dropped his head down to rest on Kon’s shoulder, enjoying the feeling of having their arms tangled around each other. The smell of cotton, detergent, and Kon filled his nose as it was pressed into the fabric of Kon’s shirt. They stood entangled for a minute, simply relishing the closeness and the relief of repressed feelings finally come to light.

Kon broke the silence and said, “I can’t believe all it took for us to get to this point was a crazy magic man smacking you with a spell.”

Tim lifted his head to make eye contact with Kon and grinned, “Would you have expected anything less?”

“At least it will make for a good story,” Kon replied, staring back with a softness in his eyes that made Tim melt.

“Yeah,” Tim said softly.

Another few moments passed, then Tim gently pulled away from Kon. Kon looked back at him like a wounded puppy, saddened by Tim’s departure.

“We’ve been in here a while,” Tim explained, “The others are probably worried.”

Kon reached out and grabbed Tim’s wrist, “They can wait a few more minutes, we both waited longer than that for this.”

Tim paused for a moment, contemplating his options, before deciding to plop a quick peck on Kon’s cheek. Kon’s face flushed and Tim grinned.

“If you can just wait a bit longer, we can pick things up later,” Tim said.

“The time won’t pass quick though,” Kon whined.

“Quickly,” Tim corrected.

“I know,” Kon retorted, “I’m messing with you.”

“Are you?” Tim asked teasingly.

Kon hesitated before responding, “Maybe I just wanted you to shut me up this time.”

“Mhm sure,” Tim said.

“So, just how bad does I gotta complete screwed up my grammar?” Kon asked with a knowing smile.

“Shut up,” Tim huffed, before planting his lips onto Kon’s once more. Kon let out a pleased hum as he leaned into the kiss.

The others would just have to wait a bit longer, a few more minutes wouldn’t be the end of the world. After all, it had taken a long time for the two of them to get to this point, and they weren’t about to be done quick.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tim when Kon keeps using incorrect grammar: I am morosexual, if you are an idiot I love you.
> 
> Anyways, I suck at writing endings but hey I actually finished this fic which is an accomplishment for me because I have ADHD and always start things but give up halfway through. But that’s why I suck at writing endings because I almost never do it.
> 
> What’s next for me? I have some drabbles that should actually remain short drabbles that I may post if I get around to finishing them. I had a draft of a start of a longer fic but I don’t like the idea anymore and I found an already written fic that was similar to my idea so uhm. I wanna write something more gen though, not a Timkon fic. Guess we’ll see. I can’t draw so writing is the only way I can really contribute to the fandom and I don’t even think I’m that great of a writer lol. I also lowkey want to attempt writing a screenplay pilot episode for a Young Justice TV show just to send to DC like "here you go, now make it" but I probably won’t ever get around to that.
> 
> Reminder that you can find me on Tumblr and Twitter @scarletbirbs for both. I am way more active on Tumblr though so if you really wanna find me, go there.


End file.
